Elements of Waste
The Elements of Waste The central tenet of Lean thinking is to maximize customer value while minimizing waste. Waste is defined as anything that does not deliver value to the customer. The 7 elements of waste in manufacturing were identified by Shigeo Shingo, based on his studies of the Toyota production system. They are: - Overproduction - Waiting - Transportation - Inventory - Motion - Over-processing - Defects1 Elements of Waste in a Service Context When translating the elements of waste from manufacturing to a services context, an eighth waste is often added, the waste of Unutilized People.2 Debashis Sarkar, from ICICI Bank created a helpful reference of the Eight Wastes of Lean as they apply to Services Organizations. Elements of Waste in Lean IT Unlike in manufacturing organizations where waste can be visible on the production floor through tell-tale signs of backlog or excess inventory, waste in IT can be harder to identify due to the intangible nature of the work-in-progress. How do you know waste in IT when you see it? Several organizations have done work to apply the concept of the elements of waste to IT. Peter Waterhouse, an Advisor from CA was the first to apply the 8 elements of waste to IT3 (which cleverly spells out the acronym DOWNTIME): - D'efects - '''O'verprovisioning - 'W'aiting - 'N'on-Value Added Processing - 'T'ransportation - 'I'nventory (Excess) - 'M'otion (Excess) - 'E'mployee Knowledge (Unused) Waterhouse's research explores the most common examples of waste in IT, the business outcome of these and some best practices for addressing these elements of waste. Bill Malik from Gartner, Inc. further explores the Lean elements of waste and how they relate to IT. In this paper, he concludes that applying Lean principles to IT "can bring benefits in quality, costs and productivity to data center operations, but each data center is different, and there is no 'recipe' for lean that applies uniformly across data centers."4 Malik also asserts that IT organizations can benefit from applying Lean principles to IT in support of a broader corporate-driven Lean initiative or even independent of such an effort. He stresses the importance of applying "continuous discipline, attention and effort to sustain lean" in order to realize the promised benefits. Malik also points out that organizations need to have achieved a certain level of process maturity in order to successfully implement lean, as it requires a clear description of operational procedures and the ability to put those practices in action. He concludes that "organizations that attain a level of maturity characterized by clear, accurate and current documentation are ready to begin reaping the benefits of lean to their infrastructure and operations function and, hence, to the business." An IDG research study5 surveyed 400 senior IT executives on the greatest sources of waste in their organizations and the processes in greatest need of improvement. The top 4 sources of waste identified were: - Inefficient IT processes - 48% - Duplication of effort - 43% - Redundant applications - 39% - Underutilized assets - 39% The processes that needed the greatest improvement were: - IT investment decision-making process - 49% - Server provisioning - 45% - Compliance - 43% - New employee on-boarding - 40% More details are avialable on: - The greatest forms of waste in IT operations and which ones organizations plan to focus on improving in the next 12 - 18 months - Processes that require most improvement -- broken down by geography - Processes that require the most improvement and those that respondents felt would yield the greatest business benefit if they were improved - Processes companies are planning to improve in the next 12 - 18 months '''Agile Development Seven Software Wastes Jack Milunsky, COO of Brightspark and author of a blog at agilsoftwaredevelopment.com documents his view of the 7 wastes in software development6. He credits Mary and Tom Poppendiek with first applying the 7 wastes to lean software development: - Partially done work - Extra features - Relearning - Handoffs - Task switching - Delays - Bugs A synopsis of Jack's views on the 7 elements of Software Development waste can be found here as well as links to the full blog text. __________________________ 1 '''Lean for Dummies, '''Natalie J. Sayer, Bruce Williams, Wiley Publishing, 2007. 2 SixSigmaIQ.com, "Eight Wastes of Lean in a Services Context," Debashis Sarkar, ICICI Bank. 3 "Waste Not, Want Not: Strategies to Reduce Eight Elements of Waste in IT," Peter Waterhouse, CA, November 2008. 4 Gartner, Inc., "Applying Lean Concepts to Infrastructure and Operations Management," Bill Malik, July 23, 2009. ID#G00169530. 5 "CIO Custom Global Research Survey: Benefits of Practical IT Innovation," Research was conducted by IDG Research Services and sponsored by CA, June 2009. 6 Agile Software Development blog, "The 7 Software Development Wastes Part 1", Jack Milunsky, June 28, 2009.